


Dreams Don't Die (But Keep an Eye on Your Dreams)

by SnarkyBreeze



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, A Plant Wrote This, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Showbusiness, Divorce, Gallows Humor, Heavy Angst, I'm Sorry, Infidelity, M/M, Merrily We Roll Along AU, Reverse Chronology, and the start of the story is the end, as in... it was happy at the start of the story, ish, or: how Yuuri ruined everything, there's a happy ending?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-26
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:46:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21979048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnarkyBreeze/pseuds/SnarkyBreeze
Summary: Katsuki Yuuri is a rich, famous, and influential songwriter and film producer.  As the years roll back over 20 years of his life, we see how he went from penniless composer to wealthy producer, and what he gave up to get there.
Relationships: Christophe Giacometti/Josef Karpíšek, Christophe Giacometti/Katsuki Yuuri, Katsuki Yuuri & Nishigori Yuuko, Katsuki Yuuri/Minami Kenjirou, Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov, Phichit Chulanont & Katsuki Yuuri
Comments: 5
Kudos: 10





	1. That Yuuri!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How did you get to be here? What was the moment?

**Los Angeles, 1976**

“I said, 'Yuuri, this movie is a watershed!'”

“I swear, one day he’ll run my studio!”

"Would you listen to that response?"

"He knows the public; he knows what they're looking for. What a guy. What a man."

The stars were shining bright in Los Angeles that night. There was a set of them twinkling in stereo, a reflection from sky to sea and back that was mirrored over and over again ad nauseum in the countless in-ground swimming pools that littered the back patios of countless sprawling high-end estates. But despite the cloudless night—perfect weather for a fancy fete of high acclaim—the skyscape wasn’t the vivid, awe-inspiring window to the ever-expanding universe that Phichit remembered it being.

Phichit loved watching the stars, though for the life of him, he couldn’t remember why. One day, years ago, he’d wandered up to a rooftop to see Sputnik blinking overhead, a marvel of modern science that had sparked inspiration in the minds of millions.

But alas, he was in LA. Phichit hated LA. There wasn’t any such thing as ‘cheap booze’ there, for one, but also, the electric circus that was Hollywood drowned out any wonder, natural or man-made, that had the misfortune of going up against it. Instead of an ever-growing, ever-changing sky of mysterious, ancient lights, Phichit looked out over a different sea of stars: the vapid masses that had come to Yuuri’s multi-million-dollar estate to pretend they cared about his latest film. So far he’d been introduced to such massively interesting folk as ‘The Guy Who Invented The Telephone Answering Machine’ and a slew of lawyers, investors, agents, and other sort-of-rich sort-of-somebodies.

He was spectacularly underdressed compared to everyone else; he’d been so sure that the cut of his shirt had been spiffy, but apparently if they weren’t painted on they weren’t worth wearing in LA. And what was the point of a shirt, anyway, without a titanium white, open-front jacket to tuck under the collar? Without half-shaded glasses, even though it was nighttime? God, he didn’t even have heels on his boots—he didn’t even have _boots,_ just shoes! He was a nobody among sort-of-somebodies! The only _anybody_ in this entire house was Yuuri, and Yuuri was off canoodling with some bright-eyed, strawberry-blond hunk who was very notably _not_ his husband.

So Phichit did what he did best anymore. He sat at the bar and stared down into a martini so dry he could have just called it vodka and tried his best to have a good time. He knew this wasn’t his first martini of the night; he couldn’t quite remember what number he was on, but next time Yuuri came around, he’d ask for a reminder. Yuuri knew Phichit was a Capital T Total Teetotaler— _ha!_ —he’d have to save that one for later, too.

A man sidled up and slid onto the stool next to him, a little too close and with a predatory hand resting on his shoulder. It was far too early in the night for Phichit to be throwing drinks. He curled his fingers around his thumbs and tried not to look too interested.

“You know, I wrote the screenplay for Yuuri’s film,” the man said, his voice too low and his breath too stale.

“Huh, your secret’s safe with me.”

That seemed to trip him up, at least. Thank god for his cutting wit, that was what got him into writing in the first place, wasn’t it? Not that he actually wrote anything anymore. Hell, he hardly wrote anything at all to begin with.

The guy stepped carefully over his wounded pride, apparently too dense to take a hint.

“So what do you do?”

“I drink,” Phichit said through gritted teeth.

“No, what do you really do?”

“I _really_ drink.”

Another bombshell diffused by light, if not slightly uncomfortable, laughter. Phichit was on _fire_ tonight.

“Ha-ha, okay pal,” the man chuckled, hopping to his feet and wandering back behind the bar. “What are you having?”

“Not much fun,” Phichit groaned, snatching up his martini and an extra bottle for refills before making his foray out into the brainless blob of beautiful people. He needed Yuuri. He was nearly three thousand miles from the so-called ‘comforts’ of his lower east side apartment and all that was familiar to him. Yuuri was the only thing that was tethering him to the place, anyway. Yuuri was the Man of the Hour, a true pursuant of The American Dream, and by god if he hadn’t achieved it. It’d been, what, twenty years at least since they’d known each other, and back then they were nothing but nobodies like everyone else. But Yuuri had never been satisfied, had never let well enough alone, and now Phichit was just one of a house full of friends, and probably the lowest of the bunch.

He didn’t intend to find Yuuri by crashing head-on into the man’s chest, but all the same, he got a nose full of some ripe, expensive-smelling cologne and an up-close view of that tight sort of deep v-neck shirt that was all the rage these days, and suddenly Yuuri had him in a half-hug, half-headlock and was wrestling the bottle of vodka from his hands.

“Peach!” he exclaimed. Yuuri was always a happy drunk, cheeks rosy and his eyes glassy but no less fun for it. He’d been bustling about the place all evening, clapping people on the back and refilling drinks, taking praise with grace and periodically announcing little, meaningless things like, ‘Hey, the party’s inside!’ or, ‘How’d you like the picture?’ without any real audience or intentions. That was just hosting. It placed Yuuri just above everyone else, and god, you could just see him swell every time he realized that.

Yuuri was currently a bit of a giggling mess, his precious side-piece clinging to his side with not a centimeter to spare between them. 

“I want you to meet Kenjirou, the star of the film,” he said. “Kenny, this is Phichit Chulanont. Phichit is my deepest, closest, best friend in the whole world. We go way back.”

“But seldom forward,” Phichit added, shaking the kid’s hand. _Kid—_ god, he must have been only twenty or so to Yuuri’s forty-two. He was a bubbly, excitable looking thing whose big, broad smile toed the border between defensive and just plain vacant. Phichit was sort of considering branching out into the world of film review just to tear him apart in one of his critiques. Hell, if Yuuri could make the switch from Broadway to Hollywood, why couldn’t he?

“Actually, Yuuri gave me the novel you wrote!” said _Kenny._ Phichit wondered if it took work to not move his lips, or if he was just stuck grinning forever. “I couldn’t put it down. I read it over and over again!”

“What, didn’t you get it the first time?”

That seemed to piss Yuuri off enough to hammer home just how ridiculous Phichit thought he was being. If he was being honest, he was struggling to pin down why exactly he was there at all. He wasn’t interested in the empty praise. Everyone in attendance besides him had some sort of agenda to push, some reason they needed to butter Yuuri up and get him in their Rolodex, and so every single stupid conversation was, ‘That Yuuri has the platinum touch when it comes to motion picture,’ and, ‘You just can’t be jealous, he’s such a gentleman!’ and for all those things were worth, not a single person except for maybe Christophe knew just what kind of amazing things Yuuri was capable of when he didn’t sell out.

A castigating glare, a protective arm around _Kenny’s_ shoulders, and suddenly Phichit’s ‘deepest, closest, best friend in the whole world’ was ushering his young star away, nudging guests as he went to try and get them inside to listen to the orchestra he’d set up in the living room.

It was more than just depressing; it was humiliating, seeing him like this.

Phichit had half a mind to shed light on the little affair he’d caught. He didn’t care much for hubby anyway, but at the very least, the man deserved to know. Maybe a kick in the pants would be what Yuuri needed to stop his wild, unbridled, self-destructive success.

Who was to say, though? He watched as Yuuri swam back through the sea of movers and shapers he called his friends, a bunch of empty shells molded into beautiful shapes and draped in an ungodly amount of brightly-colored polyester. He used to stand out in the crowd. He used to have a tell: his young, nervous charm and upstart enthusiasm made him easy to spot in gatherings like this one. Back then, Phichit had been right there with him. Phichit, Yuuri, Yuuko, and Viktor. Well… more like Yuuri… and Yuuko, Phichit, and Viktor. Something about that half-convinced half-smile and earnest, unstoppable work ethic made the showbiz types fall head over heels for Yuuri.

“Here’s to us.”

Expensive cologne, open v-neck, and when Phichit looked up, Yuuri had his gold-ringed pinkie finger extended, a gesture of invitation that had stood the test of time over two decades of deceit and betrayal.

“Who’s like us?” Phichit asked, hooking his own pinkie in Yuuri’s, but not daring to look into the eyes he hardly recognized anymore.

“Damn few.” Yuuri downed his drink and poured two new ones. “Thanks for flying out, old friend. Who could have known, all those years ago we’d be here? God, we would have been so impressed.”

“We’ve been to parties like this before.”

“Yeah, but now look who’s the host!”

 _That_ made Phichit mad. _That_ was rubbing his face in it. He’d said nothing about the complimentary tickets to the premiere. He’d said nothing when Yuuri mailed him a boarding pass for a first-class seat on a luxury airliner. He’d said nothing about any of this, and he just knew Yuuri was holding his breath waiting for his thanks or his praise or his body or whatever else it was people were throwing at him these days.

God, Phichit was gonna give it to him.

“I got a letter from Vitya,” he said. He dangled that name over Yuuri’s head like a worm, and Yuuri was too hungry to do anything but take the bait. It was delicious watching fear course through his veins, trying to deliberate to which ‘Vitya’ Phichit was referring and just why they were keeping correspondence.

“Well, at least my son still writes to _you.”_

An optimistic wager for sure, but he was right.

“He thanked me for coming to his high school graduation.”

Yuuri frowned. “He didn’t invite me.”

“He didn’t _invite_ me, either,” Phichit chided.

Perfect. The so-called small talk had him nervous. “How is Vitya, anyway?”

“He asks the same about you. Yuuri, come on, can’t we—”

A tall woman with high cheekbones and a jumpsuit that flared out into bell bottoms cut in between them, bringing with her a tight group of chattering airheads.

“Yuuri, I am beginning my next broadcast, ‘Wherever Yuuri Katsuki goes, I go, because _that’s_ where the A-list goes!’”

Phichit downed his drink with a snort. “How about that, I finally figured out what the ‘A’ stands for.”

“I heard a reliable rumor you’re selling the Malibu house,” said one of the men, holding up his glass with a knowing wink.

Yuuri laughed, clearly relieved to break the tension with a little more useless banter. “Nah, you don’t want it. The place doesn’t even have a pool.”

Phichit had _had_ it with this stupid place, with these stupid people, with stupid Yuuri Katsuki and his stupid movies. He slammed his fist down, only he forgot there was a glass in it, and as he stumbled to his feet, the thing shattered all over the bar, making the group around him jump.

_“No pool!?”_

His shout stopped conversations. Not one, not a few, but all. Yuuri looked reproachful and mortified, his hands up defensively, like maybe Phichit was going to come at him with fists. God, what he wouldn’t have given to do that, but to all things a time and a place.

Phichit hadn’t spoken a word of his mind, and after that last vodka, he was ready to start.

“In my rat’s hole in New York, there’s hardly enough water pressure to flush the toilet let alone to shower, and if you get up at a reasonable hour like the rest of the world, good luck getting hot water! I have rotted-out floors. I have to replace my mouse traps and my flypaper routinely. The entire place reeks of reefer and mold and rotten eggs, but—no pool!?My god. What’s the point? _Trash it!”_

All eyes were on him, and he came at all eyes head on with eyes of his own, and pretty soon, Yuuri was laughing nervously and waving his arms in dismissal, trying fruitlessly to diffuse the air himself.

Phichit expected fury. He expected the end of days. He received pity instead, or diplomacy, he wasn’t sure which. Either way, not what he wanted.

“Let’s have some coffee, Peach.”

“I don’t drink coffee. Caffeine isn’t good for you.”

As Yuuri ducked behind the bar for a rag and began cleaning up the mess of shattered glass, the chatter of the natives began to start back up again.

“Poor Yuuri.”

“Wow, he handled that well.”

“Such a loyal friend. He’s polite and considerate, no matter what.”

A few people brushed past, bristling as they made contact with the slob at the bar.

“It began when I tasted communion wine,” Phichit joked, though he was pretty sure it didn’t go over well with the whosowhatever he said it to.

Yuuri kept his eyes down, focused on sweeping the last few shards into the trash before preparing a glass of ice water and a plate of oyster crackers.

“I know you’re mad at me.”

“I’m not mad at _you,”_ Phichit argued. “I don’t even know who _you_ are; I’m mad at the old Yuuri who decided standing for something wasn’t worth as much as international fame.”

“Look, I’m aware that this was just a formula picture, but my next movie… Just you wait.”

“I gave up waiting.”

With that, Yuuri turned back to his friends _._ His _current_ friends.

“Well hey, who said ‘never go too far’, huh?” The aphorism was just what the party needed, along with that orchestra and the food inside, and Phichit couldn’t help but notice how insistently Yuuri was herding his guests towards the door, away, far from the mess he’d invited into his own estate.

“Yuuri!” That young, blond thing was back, apparently oblivious to all the burdens that came with age, his face alight with wonder and his lip curled only a little flirtatiously. “Yuuri! Tonight, I saw a falling star! I was running across the lawn, and it was right there in front of me, brighter than anything else in the sky!”

“Well, tonight,” Yuuri replied, “we have among us a rising star! Because no matter what the critics say about tonight’s picture, they’re certain to love you.”

“Yes, _no matter what the critics say,”_ came a deep growl from the doorway.

Phichit almost choked on his crackers. _This,_ now _this_ was more interesting than any picture Yuuri could have produced. He kept his back turned, kept to his water, even though he wanted to watch, because he was pretty sure Yuuri’s husband was about to rip at least one man apart, if not two.

He had to peek. Just a quick glance over his shoulder.

Christophe Giacommetti was once a smoldering, sensuous star of a leading man. He was still hot, for sure, still a sight to see in his well-tailored and classic suit, but time had deflated the puff of confidence in his chest, had dampened the brightness in his hazel eyes. Phichit hadn’t seen him for some years now, but he’d aged. He looked tired.

He looked on with flames in those tired eyes as his husband put a careful distance between himself and his star.

“Kenny, you know my husband, Chris.”

“Of course! Anyone who’s ever been to a Broadway show knows Christophe Giacommetti.”

“Ah, my deepest thanks. Should I kiss the hem of your garment?” Chris spat.

Yuuri made a small noise of discomfort, and Phichit pretended not to enjoy it. “Have— Have you been inside all this time, dear?”

“It’s customary, when you give a party, to attend it.”

God, this was good. It would have been too much to ask for Yuuri to have betrayed literally everyone who loved him without some sort of vulnerable, volatile underlying problem lying in wait to come to the surface.

“D-Did you sing?”

“No one asked,” Christophe said flatly. “So no. I did not sing. A word, please?”

Phichit peered over his shoulder again in time to catch Christophe turning on his heel and marching back inside and Yuuri tripping over his shoes to follow.

“Yuuri, wait!”

The rising star caught the falling star’s wrist, and the falling star jerked it out of his grasp a little too firmly.

“Later,” he huffed.

Kenny put on a formidable pout the likes of which only someone his age could have managed. “You’re ignoring me,” he whined.

“Yes,” Yuuri said, turning back to the door. “I am.”

“Well, I’ve got feelings!”

“And I’ve got a husband.”

Kenjirou threw himself in front of the door. “But I love you so much.”

This time it was Yuuri who choked. He looked like he might have returned the sentiment, and whether or not it was in deceit was yet to be determined, but the door flew open and knocked him backwards, and a lawyer or investor or something of the sort came spilling out. He brought with him a few friends and an empty glass, possibly impervious to emotional tension or general body language, because he made himself as loud and big as possible as he cut through the space.

 _“Anyway,”_ he started, as if he’d been present for the whole conversation, “I’m off. I’m headed back to New York!”

Yuuri gave a polite smile before turning seriously back to Kenny.

The friends chattered for a moment, taking their time to vacate as they made plans to call in a few weeks or write when some information had been received.

“Oh, and while you’re there, do not miss that new play by Yuuko Nishigori,” the one man suggested. “It’s the only show in years that actually deserved its Pulitzer Prize.”

The clench of Yuuri’s jaw grew tighter; Phichit was sure he saw a vein pop. It was time to throw out the theory that these men were impervious to emotional tension, too, because everybody present knew the weight of what Mr. So-And-So had just said, and nobody was about to be the one to tackle that elephant.

“Oh my god, what have I said?”

Well, okay. Nobody but Phichit.

“Don’t you know?” he said, loudly enough to be heard over a crowd that was no longer present. “In this joint, you must never, _ever_ mention the name…” he took a breath, because he cared enough to bellow this last bit. He was done going unheard. _“Yuuko Nishigori!”_

He drew out his vowels as long as he could stand to. He made a scene. He made sure Yuuri knew.

“Peach…”

“You see, Yuuko, Yuuri, and I were once these devoted, inseparable friends…”

Christophe stepped out with a puzzled expression. “Would anyone care to come inside?”

“...up until the infamous television interview where Yuuko, in front of the whole world, s—”

“Peach, _goddamnit,_ that’s enough!” Yuuri cried, his face finally breaking from its unaffected facade into a desperate grimace.

Christophe was at his side in a moment. “Phichit, I’ve warned you—”

The verbal lashing Phichit was anticipating was cut short by the arrival of the house numbers from the east coast showing of Yuuri’s film. Surprise, surprise, they were good, great even; it looked like there would be food on the table ever still, and Phichit decided it was as good a time as any to head out.

He stood as reviews were read and toasts were given.

“The surprise of _Darkness Before Dawn_ is Kenjirou Minami, a starry-eyed faun!”

An overjoyed leading man ran up to his producer and kissed him on his lips. In front of his husband. It was becoming time to leave, and fast.

“To Yuuri Katsuki, who I’ve known ever since we started at that grimy little Downtown Club in Greenwich Village!”

Celestino Cialdini cleared his throat. Phichit knew Celestino Cialdini. He represented Yuuri during the divorce.

“To Mr. Yuuri Katsuki, the client every lawyer dreams of—Forty-two years old, a hit in New York, and now a hit in Hollywood—Married to a Broadway legend—”

Phichit was going to be sick, and he was going to announce his exit before it happened He’d been filling a glass with gin as he listened, and he now raised it over his head, wandering into the center of the commotion.

“Oh, are we making speeches?”

Yuuri was crumbling; Phichit eyed him as he spoke, never lowering his arm.

“To Yuuri Katsuki, _the producer._ The man who has everything. And drunk, finished, and flat broke, I’d rather be me any day.”

He let the murmurs pulsate for a moment as he swallowed down the threat of burning bile. It was half a lie. These days he’d rather be anyone else, but he wouldn’t wish such an empty, useless life as Hollywood on anyone, not his best friend, not his worst enemy. Ironically, Yuuri was both.

“I think it’s time you left, Phichit.” There was a warning in Christophe’s voice that Phichit had no desire to heed. But before he could take a bite out of the washed-up, expired piece of wrinkled fruit that had taken the one man he’d ever loved and twisted him into an unrecognizable mockery of his former self, Yuuri stepped in.

He had that same worried look from before. That ‘You’re going somewhere dark’ look. It stung, because Phichit knew it was real, and because no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t find a way to reciprocate the message. No matter how he tried, Yuuri Katsuki was always just out of arm’s reach, even when he was right there.

“Peach, come on, can I take your glass?”

He was humiliating Phichit in front of his well-to-do guests for a second time. Phichit wasn’t going to take it; he jerked his arm away, yelling as Yuuri reached for the glass, sending the drink splattering onto the floor. The ground lurched as he tried to find his balance anew, and then he felt himself make contact with a nearby barstool, then the floor.

Almost immediately, two much larger men were at his sides, a little rougher than he would have liked, but helping him to his feet all the same, and that goddamned poolside patio was beginning to disappear into the distance behind him as he was dragged through the house to the front entrance.

“Hey now, everybody, don’t feel like you all have to go just because I’m leaving,” he shouted, resigning to just hang limp as he was given a free ride out. “Just know, just know— You’re all junk! You’re all fucking junk, and Yuuri Katsuki, you fucking deserve them!”

* * *

  
  


“Damn sad,” tutted Ciao Ciao.

Yuuri nodded, his eyes still fixed on the door, half-hoping Phichit would crawl back through it and back into his life, half-hoping they never saw each other again.

For Phichit’s sake.

Phichit deserved better.

“I never would have believed it,” Chis said with a nudge. “He’s finally out of your life.”

The pain was unbearable.

“Oh— _ow!”_

Yuuri spun around to find Kenjirou on the ground where just seconds ago Phichit had landed with a splat. He had a napkin with a few pieces of broken glass in one hand, and he cradled the other to his chest, a thick stream of bright red blood spilling onto his sleeve.

God, the night was becoming a disaster. He’d disappointed just about everyone he cared about disappointing, and he’d been left with more than a few uncomfortable guests to console. The least he could do was try not to fuck it up with Kenjirou, because god, he needed it, he needed to believe he was halfway decent to at least one person, _one_ person in his life.

He rushed over, taking the napkin from his hand and checking the wound for any pieces that might have stuck in.

“He’s bleeding. Hey, can somebody grab a roll of bandages? Some iodine?” He helped Kenjirou to his feet, brushed him off a bit.

“Honestly, Yuu, it’s nothing.” A lighthearted laugh. A sunny smile. A slight squeeze of his hand nobody could have seen or even known about except him. He was safe.

As long as he didn’t look back at Christophe, he was safe.

He was being transparent. He was being stupid. But he couldn’t do much about that now; he would be picking up the pieces from Phichit for the rest of the evening. He was in crisis mode.

It was a commotion. People knew what to do about an injured new star. They didn’t know what to do about jaded friends or difficult marriages or anything that didn’t somehow relate back to the house numbers.

“I’m just going to air it out,” Kenjirou said, escaping to the lawn. Yuuri wished he could run after him, to grab his hand and keep going, never look back at the din that would eventually dim and dwindle in that big, empty house of his. In fact, the second Kenny was gone, the crowd started to filter out too. It was one of those pivotal moments in a party like this, the shift from one hot locale to the other, the gentle flow from one outburst to the next, an amorphous blob of intrigue and boredom.

“Off to do his faun impression,” Christophe bit.

“I’m sorry, what’s wrong?” Yuuri asked, still staring down the door.

“You and Strawberry Shortcake, that’s what’s wrong.”

Oh god.

“Please don’t do this right now, we have a party going on.”

Chris snorted. “You may have betrayed me, Yuuri, but you’re not going to humiliate me.”

“When are you going to let it go?” Yuuri cried. “I never said you were too old for the part, the studio said you were too old for the part!”

“To think I divorced a man who worshipped the ground I walk on for a pitiful excuse of a man like you.” Chris’s face fell. 

Yuuri would have been sweating in his suit on a good day.

But this was not a good day, and Yuuri was on fire.

“You know,” he said through gritted teeth, “I have only made one mistake in my life. But I made it over and over again. And that was saying ‘yes’ when I meant ‘no’. Forgive me.”

He turned to go. He needed Kenny, he needed the one thing that didn’t feel awful. Fuck the rest of the party, fuck _Darkness Before Dawn_ , he just wanted to eat his weight in corned beef and get in bed for the rest of the week, goddamnit.

“Don’t you walk away from me,” Chris warned.

“Okay, do you want to know if it’s true!? It’s _true!_ It’s fucking true, but you know what? He’s actually _sensitive_ and _caring…_ He is the raft that keeps me from drowning.”

“I have to hand it to _Yuuko Nishigori_ ,” Chris hissed. “That driven little runt was the only one of us who was smart enough to get a read on you.”

That was three more times than Yuuri was willing to think about Yuuko just in the past hour. He needed to go. He needed to end it.

“I swear, if I could go back to the beginning, I’d do it all over. Back with Yuuko, writing shows? Trying to change the world? I’d give everything to go back to that!”

Chris laughed—a dry, hollow sound that was so unlike what he’d fallen in love with. “You’ve been lying to yourself for so long, you probably believe that.”

It was like the ground splitting between them, except Yuuri knew that wasn’t quite right; this wasn’t _new,_ this wasn’t even out of the routine. He’d run this gambit too many times before now with too many people—Viktor, Vitya, Yuuko… now Phichit. God, Ciao Ciao was going to kill him. The ground had split so long ago that there wasn’t just a crack between them, but a chasm.

“Don’t you see that I’m ashamed of all this? That I’m as sick of myself as you are?” he shouted, throwing the rag down on the bar. “That I just… try to keep acting like it all matters so no one will see how much I hate my life?” His voice broke; he hadn’t cried in weeks, months, even. Not since Viktor’s birthday. But goddamn it, this was it. He sat back on the bar with a little sob and looked for any bit of comfort in his husband’s eyes, but he knew there was none to be found. None deserved. Just a tired glare.

Then Kenjirou was back, and Ciao Ciao with the iodine, and before Yuuri could intervene, Chris took the medicine and stepped in.

He should have been faster. He should have taken Kenny and left the moment he had the chance, but he’d hesitated, he’d taken just a moment to gain his composure, and Chris was there, bandaging Kenny’s hand, hiding his frown behind his smile.

What could Yuuri have done? How did it happen? Once it had all been so clear… How did it start to grow? Did it slip away, bit by bit, so he never even noticed it happening?

“You know, my husband tells me you’re the starry-eyed _slut_ that keeps him from drowning,” Chris's voice was loud enough to catch the attention of the other guests. Goddamn it.

Kenny laughed; of course he did, he was so sweet and so sincere and still so hopeful.

“Christophe, come on. Stop it,” Yuuri begged.

“I’ll stop it,” Chris gritted, his anger no longer concealed, his wits at their breaking point. “Starry-eyed faun, my ass.”

Yuuri saw the jerk of his arm, heard Kenjirou’s piercing screams of pain, but didn’t process what had happened until it was well past too late. The bottle clattered to the floor, the bright yellow liquid staining Kenny’s face and hands as he clawed at his eyes.

“Oh my god, an ambulance, somebody call an ambulance,” Ciao Ciao shouted. “Get the kid under a shower, could you please?”

Kenny was whisked away. The crowd went with him. They still cared about the future of someone like him. But Yuuri? Yuuri had no future. Yuuri’s soon-to-be-second-ex-husband had just thrown iodine in the eyes of Yuuri’s future. That was it. It was done.

He was done.

On this, the day of his greatest success, Yuuri Katsuki was finished.


	2. Yuuri Katsuki, Inc.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roads may wind, and you may find what you left behind is your dream...

**New York City, 1973**

“...And that was Frank Sinatra, singing ‘Good Thing Going’ from the film of the Broadway hit, Musical Husbands. The composer and lyricist of that show are here with us in the studio tonight, and we’ll be talking to them a little bit later. But first, the news. Hal?”

“The lead-in story for tonight’s edition of News From New York: Today, our nation is at long last celebrating the cease-fire in Vietnam, the tragic death toll there having cost nearly forty-six thousand American lives. Judy?”

“Hmm… well, on the local front…”

Yuuko tuned out the monitor in the corner of the guest dressing room. She didn’t even listen to the news at home. But there she was, because there Yuuri was, and wherever Yuuri was Yuuko was, and if it wasn’t that way, Phichit would kill them both. She tried to get comfortable, but the well-worn cushions of the makeup chair weren’t exactly giving her anything to work with. She had a coffee in one hand and a cigarette in the other, and goddamnit if those weren’t the only comforts available in this high-tech hell she’d found herself in.

The makeup artist finished her work and spun the chair around, positioning Yuuko in front of the mirror with a self-impressed look.

“Whaddaya think, Ms. Nishigori?”

She’d never get used to television makeup. Hell, greasepaint was fine; she’d run the gambit of the ridiculous clown faces she’d had to make for her onstage runs, but the stage was kind to imperfections. The screen promised to be an up-close examination of every hint of the last ten years, and it looked like the cosmetician had tried to combat it by giving her another whole layer of skin.

“I look like Billie Jean King after a match,” she grumbled, taking a drag of her cigarette and instantly regretting the quip when the girl’s face fell. “Which is to say, triumphant and glowing. Thank you.”

The door slammed open just as the report switched over to the weather.

“Yuuko? Yuuko, thank god…”

Phichit. He looked… well, he looked better than the last time Yuuko had seen him. Last time, they’d decided to invite Yuuri to the Downtown Club to check out a new revue, hoping they’d knock some sense into him with a little familiar taste of the _avant garde_ theatre that had given them their start. But Yuuri had canceled last minute, hadn’t even bothered to give an excuse, and Phichit had drunk himself under the table by intermission.

To say he looked ‘good’ would be a lie; he was some sort of ruddy and bloated that Yuuko hadn’t exactly been expecting. His hair was longer than its usual neat side-part, the ends curling outward at his ears and breaking into a million little flyaways. He was probably fine, but. Well, Yuuko worried. Phichit was the only one still willing to play into Yuuri’s bullshit.

“Do _not_ talk to me, Peach; this entire thing is your fault.” She held up a hand, effectively escaping what probably would have been a nice hug. She didn’t care. She was one wrong move from exploding to begin with. “I have no idea why in heaven’s name I ever let you talk me into this humiliation.”

A page rushed in, his headset askew, his shirttails peeking out from beneath his sweater vest in station colors. He held out a glass containing ice, something clear, an olive, and a cocktail onion.

“Here’s the drink you ordered, Mr. Chulanont.”

“Oh, Phichit, how thoughtful,” Yuuko snapped, snatching up the glass. Not _here._ Not _now._ Phichit wasn’t going to do this when he was the only one with half a chance of keeping her sane.

“I need a drink.”

It’d started out slow and snowballed, the _thing_ that no one was talking about yet, the _thing_ that Phichit from five year ago would have laughed at and hated at the same time. Yuuko wasn’t about to talk about it, but she definitely wasn’t going to humor it, either.

 _“One_ drink,” she sighed, shoving the glass into Phichit’s hands. “But no more than that until after, please? I need you right now.”

“Where’s Yuuri?”

Of course. What else did Phichit care about except that, after all? Phichit was Yuuri’s shadow, his right-hand-man, even when Yuuko was the one putting in all the work. He played right along, made the excuses, gave the benefit of the doubt, and then came crawling back all betrayed and broken when Yuuri hurt him yet again. Yuuko snorted and swatted at the cosmetician’s black plastic bib until the thing fell to the floor at her feet.

“Probably off signing to score another movie, maybe closing a record deal?” She stood up and started tracing the perimeter of the room, unwilling to admit she was nervous, unwilling to admit she was scared Yuuri wouldn’t show at all, that she’d have to pitch the show herself and put on a happy face as if the whole endeavor was fine and dandy and working out great. “I can only tell you where Yuuri _never_ is, and that’s with _me,_ working on _our_ show.”

“When I called Leonard Church to set up this interview I made it very clear that all you two would be talking about was your next show and how long you’ve both been working on it.”

“Grow up, Phichit.” Anger seethed beneath Yuuko’s skin. She’d skipped the girls’ choir concert for this. She wasn’t going to be made a fool just because Yuuri was too wrapped up in Hollywood magic to come back to her level and listen for a change. “Ever since Yuuri married Chris, the only ‘working’ he knows is working the room.”

Phichit snorted over the rim of his glass. “And where did he learn that? Up on that goddamn yacht, is where, and who was it that sent him off on that goddamn yacht, huh?”

The impatience was really starting to set in. Yuuko had promised Takeshi that this wouldn’t turn into anything, that she’d only comply if no games were played, but they were down to sparing minutes before they were supposed to go on TV together, and so far it had been _nothing but_ games. She threw herself back down in her seat, arms crossed definitively. “To hell with him. I’m writing a play all on my own. In fact, if he doesn’t show up in the next 30 seconds, I’m walking out the door.”

“Yuuko, Yuuko!” Phichit dropped down to his knees next to the makeup chair. There was a desperation in her old friend’s face that Yuuko wasn’t sure she’d seen before, even knowing what she did about him. It made him look tired, even old. “I know Yuuri. If you connect with him again, if you commit with him today publicly, I promise you that tomorrow you two are going to be back together working again. We’ve gotta help save him, Yuuko. Too many lives are at stake.” He seemed to falter, the image of a smile he’d been using to pass as okay flickering as something seemed to weigh on his mind. Without raising his eyes, he held out the pinkie on the hand that held his glass. “Here’s to us. Who’s like us?”

Even after all these years, Yuuko couldn’t find a good reason not to link her pinkie into his. “Damn few.”

They lingered like that for a moment. It somehow felt empty, the way that vow sounded only spoken by two. They both knew it. They both felt it, just how they both felt every minute impact of Yuuri’s carelessness ever since Chris.

“Why can’t it be like it was?” Phichit hummed wistfully, almost longingly. “How’d we end up so mean and jaded?”

“We were nicer then,” Yuuko agreed.

“We were nice… kids and cities and trees were nice… Yuuko, I don’t know who we are anymore, and… and I’m starting not to care. Think about it. It was better then. The three of us.”

“We are not the three of us anymore. We are one and one and one.”

Phichit laughed, a slow, subdued sort of puff that barely carried the writer’s usual mirth with it. “Isn’t that the same mistake everyone makes though? Blaming the way it is now on the way it was?”

Yuuko shook her head. “Jesus, Peach, you’re still in love with him.”

There was no feign of laughter after that. Just the somber settling of a face too used to smiling, a face that had long worn out its old habits. “Maybe I’m the one who needs saving, then,” Phichit murmured, his eyes fluttering to gaze aimlessly at the floor. Yuuko’s urgent anger almost cracked for the sorry sight. Out of all of them, it wasn’t supposed to have been Phichit. He had always been the optimist, the cheer, the bright side. He couldn’t be dragged down too, not in a decent world.

Esteemed broadcast journalist Leonard Church flew in, pages flying off his clipboard. “Ms. Nishigori, there’s a report on Reagan and then it’s us. Are you ready?”

Yuuko felt the wash of indifference that cooled her aggravated mind and pounded her voice into something flat and unaffected. “Mr. Katsuki isn’t here yet,” she murmured, leaving Phichit kneeling on the floor as she got up and fixed her skirt.

“He isn’t here? Where the hell is Yuuri?”

Speak of the devil and he doth appear. If only it had been three or ten mentions earlier.

“Yuuri is here and Yuuri is sorry. Ever since Chris and I got married, it’s been nothing but meetings, meetings, meetings!!”

Ah, good.

 _He_ was there.

The star.

The one who had once symbolized promise and fortune, the harbinger of the end dressed in Rafael couture. He breezed through, his hand clasped by the possessive hands of his hurried husband, a gracious, albeit unwelcome, smile drawn across his flawless fucking face.

Yuuri seemed to want to tuck Christophe away in a corner for one reason or another, and he used his lips to corral his stallion back where he wanted him. It was comfortable for no one, and, more importantly, it dug a wrench of repulsion into Yuuko’s stomach.

When Yuuri finally actually turned to greet her, his smile seemed genuine, but his head was so clearly full of its own Los Angeles garbage that it didn’t matter.

“Hey, old friend.” The hug was the same. He felt just the same, the same old Yuuri that had split rent with her and hung curtains to make their studio seem like an honest, decent apartment and had chased out ex boyfriends brandishing a table lamp just on her behalf. It was like meeting a clone, an exact copy, perfect in every way except for that one, unnameable thing.

Well, in this case, it wasn’t _that_ unnameable. After all, ‘unnameable’ had a household name, and he was hovering in the corner, ready to support his husband as he went to battle his past on live television.

“Phichit! You look amazing!” Lie. “Have you lost weight?” Flattery.

It didn’t matter, though. Phichit preened under the attention as if it was really meant for him. “Oh, 180 pounds, give or take, but he still calls from time to time.” It made Yuuko want to choke. That was what Yuuri did. It was his god-given power, the ability to glad-hand and cavort as though none of his not-so-secret inner workings were designed to widen the gap between him and everybody else. 

Leonard, thankfully, was on a commercial-break deadline and was not going to make any compromises. “No time, no time! Yuuri, _Yuuri,_ in the chair. Yuuko, you’re coming with me.”

He began to drag Yuuko away with him, a welcome reprieve from the inevitable drama the breezed in on Yuuri’s heels. He smelled like coffee, cigar smoke, and last night’s whiskey. Anything was better than Yuuri’s too-clean, too-expensive aftershave. 

But the drama demanded its say in situations such as these. Drama, it seemed, had plans of its own, and drama marched behind them in its Rafael tweed with a self-important air.

“Leo, darling? I think I saw my ex-husband hovering around outside,” Chris said, his utterly transparent pull for attention fooling nobody. Leonard seemed inclined to listen, however. His footsteps faltered, causing Yuuko to have to go into a quick shuffle-ball-change to avoid running into him. “Could you see to it that nobody’s allowed in? He’s becoming an eternal sponge.”

“Sure. Fine. Yuuko. Let’s go.”

* * *

  
  


“Now, did you have to go and do that?” Yuuri grumbled as a makeup lady battered his face with a powdered sponge. “I told you, I’m on thin ice with her as it is. Can you please keep the dramatics to a minimum!?”

Christophe didn’t hear him. It figured; some upstart young boob was stammering away in his face, no doubt trying to squeeze in some networking with the one person who wasn’t five seconds from appearing on national television.

“Excuse me Mr. Giacometti? Leroy. Jack Leroy. I know this is inappropriate, but I wrote a film script, _Darkness Before Dawn,_ that would be just perfect for you.”

Chris glowed under the contrived limelight. Yuuri watched the greasepaint trickle down from the heavens and paint him tickled pink.

“It _is_ inappropriate,” he offered, the benevolence in his voice just enough to put the man on edge without scaring him away. “Give it to me. I’ve decided that if I don’t want people handing me scripts, then I can never go out.”

The young man seemed to want to stay and chat, but Christophe showed about as much interest in him as Yuuri had with this interview. After a few moments of thumbing with feigned investment through what was bound to be another brick in the wall of ‘to reads’, he sauntered over to the makeup chair, close enough that Yuuri could feel the warmth of his body against his shoulder.

He tried to lighten up. Chris was his _husband,_ after all.

“Yuuri, have you told Phichit that we’re closing a three-picture deal?”

The trickle of ice that had been teasing at the collar of Yuuri’s shirt suddenly avalanched out and down the expanse of his back. The silence that chased Christophe’s words said it all, and as he turned to take in Phichit’s face, he could tell that the news was far from favorable.

“Oh no…” Phichit breathed.

“Thank you… _darling,”_ Yuuri gritted. “But please? Let me be the one to tell Yuuko? I’m waiting to find the right moment,” he added to Phichit, as though the perfect timing could prevent the impending schism that he was sure to cause.

Whether his words caught receptive ears was difficult to say. Christophe looked properly pleased with himself. “I’ve been explaining to Yuuri that if you produce a Broadway musical, you’re famous in New York, but produce a Hollywood film and you’re famous the world over.”

The door burst open at just that moment, before any of the three of them had a chance to process the weight of the situation, and the harried face of Leonard Church appeared in the entrance.

“Yuuri, we are on _now._ We have to go.”

“Oh, hell,” Phichit moaned, downing the rest of his drink.

It was still so jarring to Yuuri to see Phichit drink.

Dread pooled like a puddle of crude in his gut, gurgling and stinking as he rushed on Leo’s heels to the soundstage. That was too close a call for his liking; he knew the news was sensitive, especially when he’d been falling back on Yuuko’s ethic to get anything done for _Take A Left._ He just didn’t see any money in New York anymore. Everywhere he turned, he found dead ends or roads he’d already endured too many times before. He’d always fought for success. Things were becoming too stagnant. He needed to _move._

From her chair across from Leo, Yuuko looked like she might breathe fire already, her leg bouncing impatiently as her jaw clamped down tightly on the words that Yuuri knew were fighting to burst out. Thank god for national television. He took his place on the darkened stage and waited, listening to the shrill tenor of the announcer the next set over.

“And now our evening’s top news story: Today the Supreme Court gave its final reading ruling in favor of the legalization of abortion. The court stated that such a procedure should be a choice made between a woman and her physician—a long-time controversy now ended. Judy?”

“For those who have tuned in late, we have been listening to Frank Sinatra singing the hit song by Yuuri Katsuki and Yuuko Nishigori, our next guests live from New York.”

“Oh, Yuuri, I cannot thank you enough for this favor,” Leo said, his usual television affect dropped as the crew scurried around making their preparations to go live.

“Favor?” Yuuri asked. “After what you did for me during my divorce?”

“Oh, _that’s_ why we’re here,” Yuuko muttered beneath a half-ton of disdain.

“How’s your son?”

A fine enough question, although Yuuri hadn’t heard from Vitya in a few weeks now. “Uh… want to see a picture?” he asked nervously.

“No, but do that on the air, they’ll love that,” Leo assured. “I’ll coo and I’ll tear and I’ll carry on like a madman. People love cheap sentiment.” He chuckled to himself before seeming to remember something forgotten, his notes dropping with great occasion into his lap. “Oh! And I understand some congratulations are in order! I hear you signed a three-picture film production deal?”

No.

No, it wasn’t supposed to happen like _that._

Yuuri wheeled around to where Yuuko seemed to have transmogrified into a pillar of ice.

“W-Where’d you hear that…?”

Leonard Church looked quite pleased with himself. “Oh, I have my spies. But don’t worry, I understand I’m not supposed to bring it up on the air.”

“I don’t think you were supposed to bring it up in front of me,” Yuuko added. She didn’t have her usual, careful tone, the one that meant Yuuri was toeing a line. No, everything about Yuuko screamed betrayal, and it should have.

“Yuuko, I was waiting for the exact moment to tell you… But see, it doesn’t change our plan, it’s only two or three months at a time…”

“It’s always only two or three months at a time,” Yuuko snapped.

“I haven’t even signed a contract yet.”

“Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for us to finish this project!?” The pain in Yuuko’s eyes was worsened by the ever-increasing pitch and volume of her voice.

“Okay, wrap this up in a second can you? We’re just about on,” Leo murmured defensively.

“Yuuko, I have a son to support,” Yuuri hissed, straightening for the opening shot. “I have an ex-husband draining me. What happens if we finish the show, we get it on, and they say it’s no good?”

The fire in Yuuko’s eyes was enough to burn down the entire studio. “Yuuri, I have _triplets_ to support! I don’t give a rat’s ass what they say!” She rammed an accusing finger in Yuuri’s face. He took it. He deserved to. He knew. “If _you_ say it’s good, if _I_ say it’s good, that’s what’s important! That is all that’s _ever_ important!”

“Well, Yuuri knows we’re about to start,” Leo boomed, his television voice now employed in full force.

Yuuko laughed, shrill, cold, and mirthless. “Yuuri knows it’s only good if it makes a fucking fortune!”

 _“Hi, we’re back_ with Today in New York’s celebrity spot. And next to me, we have two brilliantly talented people.”

The rolling camera was the only glue that could keep Yuuri’s life together in that moment. He felt a rush of relief as Leo’s voice went prime time.

“The man to my immediate left is…”

Leo paused, a beat that was never meant to be, before Yuuri realized it was his cue to introduce himself.

“Oh. Uh. Yuuri Katsuki. I almost forgot.”

“And?”

God, that smile was forced. Yuuri turned to watch Yuuko make her introduction, but whatever was roiling just beneath Yuuko’s exterior was more than courtesy or custom could contain.

“And he is. Why should he lie?” she bit, her voice a storm of anger and defeat. “And I have no idea who _I_ am.”

 _Jesus._ Come on, pull it together, just for now, just for TV! “And this is my great friend and even greater collaborator, Yuuko Nishigori,” Yuuri laughed, reaching out with the intention of touching his old friend’s shoulder, but resigning to hover it awkwardly instead before returning it to his own lap.

“They are the songwriters for _Musical Husbands,_ both the show and the movie. They also wrote _Sweet Sorrow,_ and their newest collaboration will be called _Take a Left,_ but more about that later.”

“Apparently _much_ later,” Yuuko added bitterly. Yuuri shot a warning glance that ricocheted uselessly off her stony demeanor.

“Now Yuuri, you recently married the star of those shows, Christophe Giacometti, did you not?” Leo asked, his smile practiced and patient despite his most distraught of interviewees.

“Yes, that is correct,” Yuuri replied drily.

“And I’m married to Takeshi,” Yuuko cut in forcefully. The disparity of interest in Leo’s curt nod was stark and played exactly into her hands. She was trying to paint Yuuri as some greedy Iscariot-type, and knowing full well there was nothing he could do about it in front of a home audience. Nothing he _would_ do. Not if he wanted to stay in public favor. Something he already had. Something she didn’t have to worry about.

“Now, all of Broadway says you two are the next Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Lowe!”

“Irving and Berlin,” Yuuko offered. It was enough to throw the practiced reporter off his rhythm.

“Hah. Yes,” Leo said vaguely. “Let’s start from the beginning. You’re both from Chicago. You both went to the same school _and_ the same college—”

“No,” Yuuko chuckled. “Me Columbia, him… _Julliard.”_

She was smiling now, a sort of crazed, manic grin that she brandished menacingly at Leo. Yuuri didn’t like that. Yuuko got a certain way when she was upset. A certain spiteful, uncooperative way. This was already looking hopeless.

“So your entire lives, you’ve been very, very close friends—”

“Until today.”

“Like all partners, we have had fights and other commitments,” Yuuri amended, switching his tactic to direct a pleading glance behind him, “but the magic is only there when it’s me and Yuuko— _Yuuko and me,”_ he corrected.

“I love it!” Leo said with a grin, the gratitude thick in his voice even if every ounce of positivity was mere performance. “Now tell me, how do you two work together?”

“Oh, may I answer that?” Yuuko said, thrusting out a hand to quiet any other possible chatter and smiling knowingly in Yuuri’s direction. “How do we work together? Sure. It starts as you might expect, actually, Yuuri plays around on his piano until he finds something touching, I play around on my typewriter until I string some words together that make sense, something heartfelt, you know? We can get into a pretty good rhythm that way, just me and Yuuri, like he said. After you’ve created for so long, if you keep it up with consistency, it just becomes habit, and you can start to find things that work!”

“So then—in this little hypothetical pastiche, if you may—then, the phone rings. This is just working together. And Yuuri goes over, ‘Mutter mutter mutter mutter, yes Ciao Ciao, mutter, no Ciao Ciao, mutter mutter mutter.’ It’s his lawyer, Ciao Ciao. ‘Mutter mutter mutter, _do it, Ciao ciao.’_ And then a click, and a, ‘Sorry, Yuuko,’ and he’s back to the piano. And soon we’re humming along!”

“And that’s called writing a play, just like that—when we can, that is. Then, maybe, BZZT! the buzzer goes off. ‘Sorry, Yuuko.’ He has this brash, obnoxious buzzer. BZZT! Secretary. BZZT! On the intercom. ‘Yes, Miss BZZT?’ ‘It’s the messenger!’ ‘Thanks Miss BZZT, will you tell him to wait? Will you order the car? Will you call up the bank? Will you wire the coast?’ and before he can even finish _that_ thought, the phone is ringing again. ‘Sorry, Yuuko. Mutter mutter mutter mutter, sell the stock, mutter, buy the rights, mutter mutter mutter mutter mutter…’ BZZT! And then he has to put someone on _hold,_ and he’s got an _interview,_ and he can’t even get his own thoughts straight there’s just so much to think about before he even _gets_ to the music.”

“But the telephones blink, and the stocks get sold, and the rest of us sit around and wait for him. And he’s gonna start producing. And he’s now a _corporation._ Right? Well, I’ve got three kids of my own, and my husband Takeshi, like I said, and it’s lots of hard work just _sitting and waiting,_ so I’m trying my hand at some other things… I’ve got a little sailboat. I’m trying to meditate.”

The rampage had a momentum far stronger than any flaccid attempt Yuuri could make at stopping it. He couldn’t figure out what to say. Normally he had a quip, an out, but she left him with nothing as she raged.

“So, he flies off to California, which is good, because I always feel sort of guilty if he’s still in the state when I rant about him to my therapist, but… you know. That’s just how we work. That’s me and Katsuki Yuuri, Incorporated.”

Leo blinked, the shock of processing _all of that information_ passing across his face for just a moment as he fished for a response.

Always a professional.

Yuuri could count on professionals.

“Well, when you _do_ work together,” he suggested diplomatically, “which comes first generally: The lyrics or the music?”

“Generally?” Yuuko deadpanned as if she needed any sort of clarification. “The contract.”

Yuuri wished he could slink away into the shadows, that he could get up and walk off, but he had too much riding on this publicity spot to remove himself. He could only sit, stiff replication of a strained smile plastered on his face, and beg Leo with his eyes to find the right deflection that could eject him from this humiliation.

“That sounds like you think making money is a bad thing for an artist.”

_Oh no._

“Money? Did _I_ say money?” Yuuko asked incredulously. “No, believe it or not, I quite like money. I mean, it’s better than not, right? Leonard—can I call you Leonard? Money is great. But money-hungry? This bloated, famished, piggish grab for as much money as you can get your hands on, _‘cause you should…_ ” She seemed to burn, a righteous, seething something that temporarily shut her up just long enough to get her bearings. “Look. Yuuri does the money thing very well. But you know what? Other people do it better. And Yuuri does the _music_ thing _very_ well. And you know what? No one does it better.”

“Still, he spends most of his time with telephones and buzzers, and I really don’t know what he does, but he makes a ton of money, and a lot of it for me. I just wait at home with the triplets, you know, don’t your viewers love cheap sentiment? I’m a stay at home mother most of the time. Aww. Look at me. I play with the kids, maybe I start a new play, and _he_ somehow knows, because inevitably I get that call. ‘Hiya, buddy, wanna write a show? Got a great idea! We’ll own all the rights with a two-week out and a turnaround on the guarantee plus a gross percent of the billing clause…’ and then I have to fly out to California and talk deals and do _business,_ because it’s nothing but _business_ when you’re working with Yuuri Katsuki, Inc. That’s sneaky, right?” she laughed, clapping a hand to her forehead. “I thought we were just writing music! Nope, it’s back in business, and I mean just that.”

Leo looked weary as he scraped through his now-useless notes. Their time was almost up and almost all of it had been devoted to Yuuko’s crazed ranting about just how horrible Yuuri was, just as Yuuri was trying to get his feet off the ground in a new discipline… He genuinely couldn’t understand how the poor reporter was still pushing forward.

Yuuko flapped her hands defensively, diffusing the tension created as best she could. “Wait, could we wait a minute here? I’m getting in a little too deep.”

“Now Yuuri, can we—” Leo attempted weakly.

“The thing,” Yuuko continued, shooting daggers at the poor guy, “you see, is we’re not that kind of close anymore, not the way we used to be. And friendship is like a garden. You have to water it. You have to tend it. You have to care about it, or you lose it. And I miss it. And I want it back.”

Yuuri was becoming acutely aware of a commotion brewing just beyond the range of the stage lights, a frenzy of panicked network execs and stunned crewmen trying to figure out just how to tackle this on-screen dumpster fire of an interview. He figured it must have been something similar to the state of the inside of his brain at the moment, scrambled and desperately searching but unsure where to start or what to do to right this. How to mitigate the absolute disaster this was going to bring into his already-rocky career.

He knew there was no moving forward after this.

He couldn’t believe he’d been hoping for forgiveness when his punishment was unforgivable in itself.

“Look,” Yuuko was saying, her eyes darting from Leo to the cameras and back. “Nothing permanent has happened. It’s just a glitch in the system. I mean… friendship’s something you don’t really lose… right? Yuuri… Ladies and gentlemen, don’t let me lose the best composer a lyricist ever had. Phone him, write him, stop him on the street—you’ll recognize him; he’s the one going through his checkbook—and tell that man to get back to his piano. When it feels like every day… I’m on the brink of… you know it’s very sneaky, how it happens… First the prizes, the paper articles, the interviews…”

She seemed to drift off then, blinking dazedly around the studio for a moment, taking in the whirlwind of activity around them before snapping back into herself. Yuuri could see the moment of realization in her face, the reality of just how far she’d gone setting in, and he could see the exact moment when she decided she didn’t care.

“Oh my god…” Yuuko feigned surprise at… well, everything. She ran clownishly-shaking hands over the fabric of the couch, her eyes widening dramatically at the sight of Leo. “I think it’s happened! Someone stop me quick, it’s one more triumph that I simply can’t refuse! In case you didn’t notice, this is my first time on TV—and my last!”

That was it. It was over. Folks were beginning to flood the set— _offscreen_ -type folks, the kind who existed only for this type of fluke, inching their way toward Yuuko as if at any moment she might explode like a hydrogen bomb. 

“Whatever happens, remember it’s all about _him!”_ she yelled, jumping to her feet on the sofa cushion, up and out of the way of her apprehenders and gesturing wildly in Yuuri’s direction. “That’s the guy we all love, the reason I’m here! He’s the man on the inside, muttering away to his lawyer to call the president or _anybody_ who could get the crazy lady off his TV screen! Buzzers and telephone calls! Yuuri Katsuki, Incorporated—just write him, care of any bank, U.S.A.—”

“Now let’s go to a commercial break,” Leonard Church rasped, his makeup smearing as he ran two shaking hands down his cheeks. The second he got his cue his was on his feet, a million miles from anywhere that implicated him with the sort of nonsense that had just gone down on his own segment. “Oh, uh…. Thanks… guys. Jesus fucking Christ.” Without a look back. Without that question about Vitya or a handshake or anything that meant anything good after an interview, Leonard Church stormed back to the green room, taking the harried crew with him.

The empty soundstage was suddenly very much so. Quiet. Yuuri knew it was up to him to break it. It was his move; he was the king in check, after all, but he couldn’t find the thing that would make his legs move, couldn’t find the connection from brain to mouth to say what needed to be said. Somewhere, somewhere beyond the vast darkness of the studio beyond the lights, came the shouting of expletives and the slamming of doors. But on the interviewer’s couch, there was nothing but the tension of two gears in a suddenly very obvious machine, grinding against one another in volatile silence.

He wished Yuuko would just say something, justify the past ten minutes of their lives, but he knew that she had said her piece. It was his turn. He chewed his lip for far too long in fear that opening his mouth would unleash a righteous rage not unlike that which he had just endured. He sat and shuffled and stewed, until finally the silence was far more unbearable than anything that could have filled it.

“That… That was a real slaughter, Yuuko. Congratulations.”

“Yuuri—”

“I think you’ve said enough.” He stood. He was suddenly far too close to this powder keg. “I know for years you’ve been attacking me and constantly putting me in the position of having to defend myself, but… _that?_ I don’t know why anyone in their right mind would so want to humiliate and betray their best friend in the world quite like _that._ But I do know you’re never going to have the opportunity to do it again. You’re goddamn out of my life, Yuuko.

“I’m sorry…”

“You’re sorry!?” Yuuri’s chest tightened; the air thinning around him as he fought to fend off a panic he hadn’t felt since Viktor. “After you publicly mock and ridicule and belittle me when I swear, I’d lay down my life for you…”

“If you’d just let me—”

 _“Shut up!”_ His shouting echoed throughout the emptiness around them, parodied itself in rapid chorus before fading out again. It was his turn to wag a finger, his turn to give accusation. “Yuuko, all these years, I’ve loved you no matter what you did. But I guess, because I don’t live my life like you, or the way you’d like me to, you just _had_ to cut me down and watch me bleed.” He put everything he had between them as his own voice clattered in his ears, as feet stamped and spit flew. “Well, I like my life. So you please get the hell out of it!”

He shouldered past some sorry slob who was moments from walking in on them, already out the door and in the fluorescent lights of the hallway before he realized it had been Phichit. He spun around just in time to see a face wounded and worried.

“Guys, can’t we just go out and have a drink and talk? We need to talk!”

“Yes,” Yuuko said, jumping to her feet, running after him and pulling Phichit with her. “Yes, please, Yuuri, let’s just go and talk.”

Josef Karpisek was hovering at the end of the hall, and Christophe looking put off and pitiful at his side, and suddenly dealing with Joe seemed far more palatable than any mention of ‘old friends’ or working together or making things right.

He had a new life, now. He’d had a new life for years, and it was about time he started living it.

“Yuuri, can I just— _hey!”_

Yuuri wheeled around so quickly his elbow made contact with something before he could process what that _something_ was. Before he could figure it out, Yuuko was sprawled on the ground, a hand to her jaw, and evil in her eyes.

He hadn’t meant to do that. He hadn’t meant to hurt anybody. Without thinking, he stepped forward to help her up and received a face full of fist, Takeshi’s diamond ring and all, and felt the hot stream of blood start to trickle down his cheek. And then it was _him_ on his ass, and Yuuko looming over him, all streaks of mascara and angry shouting and wailing fists, and suddenly somewhere beyond the pain erupting in his face and the congestion of thick, metallic blood blocking his airways, Phichit and Christophe were prying them apart, the din of shouting too much to comprehend.

Yuuri had read somewhere about a tribe of people, somewhere in the world, whether it was true or fiction he couldn’t remember. But whenever one of its members would do something cruel, or _evil,_ or betrayed any one of them in any way, they just… never saw him again. They never looked at him, they never spoke to him… or acknowledged him in any way. For them, he was dead. Absolutely and irrevocably dead.

It was the only way forward that he could see.

There would be no _Take A Left,_ no more Broadway hits. There would be no more tense meetings like this.

Yuuko Nishigori was dead to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!
> 
> As always, kudos and comments are always accepted and appreciated - I want to hear your feedback and I will never respond negatively, even if you have a criticism or a problem. Let me know what you think!
> 
> Subscribe or follow me on [Twitter](http://twitter.com/snarkybreeze) for more updates!


End file.
